The difference between Seward and a real statesman, is this: that a statesman is always, and very wisely, chary about committing himself in writing, and only does it when compelled by absolutely irresistible circumstances, or by temptations brilliant enough to overrule all other considerations; for, such a statesman never for one moment forgets or disregards the old adage which saith that "_Verba volant, scripta manent_." But Seward, on the contrary, literally revels in a flood of ink, and fancies that the more he writes, the greater statesman he becomes. At the beginning of this month, I wrote to the French minister, M. Mercier, a friendly and respectful note, warning him against meddling with politicians and busybodies. I told him that, before he could even suspect it, such men would bring his name before the public in a way neither pleasant nor profitable to him. M. Mercier took it in good part, and cordially thanked me for my advice. _Nov. 19._--Burnside means well, and has a good heart; but something more is required to make a capable captain, more especially in such times as those in which we are living. It is said that his staff is well organized; God be praised for that, if it really is so. In that case, Burnside will be the first among the loudly-lauded and self-conceited West-Point men, forcibly to impress both the military and the civilian mind in America, with a wholesome consciousness of the paramount importance to an army of a thoroughly competent and trustworthy staff. The division of the army into three grand corps is good; it is at once wise and well-timed, following the example set by Napoleon, when he invaded Russia in 1812. If his subordinate generals will but do well, I have entire confidence in Hooker. He is the man for the time and for the place. As a fighting man, Sumner is fully and unquestionably reliable; but I have my doubts about Franklin. He is cold, calculating, and ambitious, and he has the especially bad quality of being addicted to the alternate blowing of hot and cold. Burnside did a good thing in confiding to General Siegel a separate command. The _New York Times_ begins to mend its bad ways; but how long will it continue in the better path? _Nov. 20._--England stirs up and backs up rebellion and disunion here; but, in Europe, for the sake of the unity of barbarism, Islamism, and Turkey, England throttles, and manacles, and lays prostrate beneath the feet of the Osmanli, the Greeks, the Sclavi, the heroic Montenegrins. England is the very incarnation of a treachery and a perfidy previously unexampled in the history of the world. The _Punica fides_, so fiercely denounced and so bitterly satirized by the historians and poets of old Rome, was truthful if compared to the _Fides Anglica_ of our own day.